The New Berlin

Frankfurt, Germany

The city of Frankfurt is only an hour south of Marburg. Moritz, Becky and I went down for a day to do some shopping and see the sights. The city pretty much felt like any metropolis back in the states with its concrete streets and tall buildings. In the center of the city exists a no-driving zone, where people are allowed to walk on the streets. Its a pretty cool idea and Moritz told me its common in every major German city. Around the main shopping center were street performers, restaurants and every major label shopping center.

For lunch, I had a Bratwurst from a guy at a portable stand. It was pretty decent and I was amazed when the guy didn't accept my tip! Near the end of the day, I was hanging out in front of American Apparel while Moritz and Becky picked up some clothes when I saw this big crowd of guys headed my way.

Standing in front of me while sitting in front of AA were two girls talking and smoking cigarettes. This huge crowd of guys, probably 20 deep walked up to them, about half of them had beer and wine bottles in their hands(open containers are legal). In the center of the crowd was this one really tall guy wearing a white shirt and what looked like a basketball hoop on his back. He walked up to the two ladies and immediately started saying a bunch of stuff in German. I had no clue what they were saying but based on the girls body language, they were weirded out.

Then, the guy pulled out a small rubber basketball from his pocket. Immediately the girls lightened up. The guy handed one of the girls the ball then took a few steps and turned around. All the guys in the crowd starting clapping and cheering as the girl lined up her shot. The shot ended up hitting the guy in the back of the head and bounced to the ground. Everyone laughed and the white shirt guy walked back up to the girls and took out a stick of lipstick. Laughing, both girls applied the lipstick, kissed the guys t-shirt and then signed their names! This whole time, I sat on the bench taking pictures as the dumbstruck American that had no clue about what was going on. The crowd all took pictures together with the girls then drunkenly kept moving on.

As soon as they left Momo and Becky came out. I told them the whole story of what had just transpired. They laughed and explained that the white shirt guy was about to get married and it was his Facking Bachelor Party! Apparently, its tradition before marriage in Germany to go do crazy/stupid/fun things, especially in public. Its widely known across Germany about these 'rituals' and people love to play along. I definitely agreed that it was an awesome ritual and definitely plan on bringing this tradition to the states(LARGE!) After Frankfurt, my next stop on my euro trip was to the Northeast.

Berlin, Germany

"Hi Honeys, Ready for Sausage Time?" was my first impression of Berlin. After a breezy 5-hour carpool ride on the Autobahn from Marburg to Berlin I was hanging out with my old friend from Mtn. View, Andre Krois aka Kroisberg. Kroisberg was a german exchange student at my high school during my junior year. We met during Cross-Country and swam on the swim team together. Obviously, Tibetans and Germans have some bond. During the 5 years between his time and Mtn. View and a few weeks ago we hadn't kept in touch. On a visit back to my old high school the week before I left the States I was able to hunt him down via my old guidance counselor. After exchanging a few e-mails I figured out that he was back in Berlin, fresh from a year and a half stint in Australia teaching Scuba Diving. After meeting up with Kroisberg at his flat we hit the streets of Berlin for a drink. Upon hopping off the S-Bahn/Subway we emerged downtown.
I definitely knew that prostitution was legal in Germany, but didn't know the extent of how prevalent it was. Every one we walked by tried to get our attention and kept asking, in German of course, if we had some spare time. The best one though, was the 'sausage' lady who walked up right in front of us and stopped us. Kroisberg and I grabbed a drink at the "Hollywood Stars Cafe" and then checked out a few more bars.

The next morning we got an early start, as I only had one day on Berlin. Our whirlwind tour of the city consisted of pretty common tourist things, seeing German movie stars, fighting stormtroopers, hopping on tanks and riding conference bikes. Our first stop was the Wall. It was pretty crazy to see the actual object that divided this city and I was amazed that large portions of the wall were still kept up. A bunch of construction people were white-washing the wall too. Kroisberg asked why they were doing it and the foreman explained that the original artists who had drawn their art on the wall over 20 years ago were coming back to redo artwork.
It seemed pretty cool to be doing that and to bring closure for those people who had lived in East Berlin under the communists. And of course, I took the standard foreigner picture by the wall.

Checkpoint Charlie was our next destination and it was again flooded by tourists. On the way there, we ran into the filming of a movie and saw Til Schweiger, who is apparently is apparently a really famous German actor. Apparently, he was in Tomb Raider and Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo. Kroisberg and I really didn't give a crap and kept walking. At the Brandenburg gate there were more tourists galore. By the way, during my whole time in Germany it was so easy to spot the American tourists because they were the clueless ones speaking in loud English, had huge cameras, sandals, shorts and the Hawaiian shirts. It was really disturbing to witness how America is represented in other countries. At the Brandenburg gate, there were an assortment of characters including, stormtroopers, large bears and angels, all dressed up and ready to take a picture with you in front of this historic monument of German history. Heading deeper into the city we saw an old Soviet monument to soldiers during WWII with two T-34 soviet tanks. I hopped on board for a quick pic, cleverly eluding the Polizei. The best part of Berlin though, was when I spotted a Conference Bike! A friend from college's grandpa was the one who invented it and I had the awesome chance to ride it back in Tacoma. Kroisberg and I jumped on, joining some danish girls on summer holidy and we proceeded to ride around the central park. The driver of the bike was pretty crazy, I almost fell off several times as we swerved through pedestrian and bike traffic. Our last stop for the day was the Berlin Zoo, a huge park near the center of the city. At the zoo, we saw Knut, the magical ice bear. After throwing back a few beers at the playground zoo, I headed back to Marburg via the amazing German carpool system. I shared a ride back with three cool German dudes named Sven, Patrick and Joel. We talked about everything on the 5 hour drive back from topics ranging from the WWII, Iraq, EU, Turks and the abundance of prostitutes in Germany. 12 hours later I was back at Frankfurt Intl. Airport saying goodbye to my gracious hosts, Moritz and Becky.
Hanging out with them was definitely the best part of my trip and I learned a ton about Germany, Germans and Eurotrash (not Momo and Becky, of course)

The line for the Air India gate was huge. I inquired with an attendant about what the hold up was and she told me the computer systems had crashed and that they were working on it. My flight was leaving in an hour and a half, but she ASSURED me that all flights would wait for the passengers and be delayed half an hour. After a two hour wait in the line I finally made it to the front desk. Upon checking my bags and receiving my ticket, I asked the attendant what time the flight would be leaving. She double-checked my ticket, then quickly grabbed the phone and started dialing. She started arguing in Hindi on the phone with whoever she was talking to. I started to get worried. She slammed down the phone then said to me, "Sir, your plane is about to take off you will need to head there immediately" I froze and quickly absorbed the info, if I didn't make the flight, that would throw a wrench in my India plans as I had a relative coming down from Dharamsala to the Delhi airport the following day. I asked the attendant how far away and where the gate was. She told me I was at gate 67, pointed me in that direction and stated that I still had to pass through customs and security which would take at least 15 minutes. After yelling "Damnit!" Jack Bauer style I sprinted towards my terminal, determined to catch my flight to India.